Episode 8: Mindfulness + Life's Mystery with Bob Stahl

EPISODE OVERVIEW

Bob Stahl has founded 8 Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) programs in medical centers throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. He is a long time practitioner of mindfulness meditation, having lived and practiced for over eight years in a Buddhist monastery, and is the guiding teacher at Insight Santa Cruz and a visiting teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center. Bob is moved by the Buddha's teachings about impermanence and the body. At one point, he needed to re-learn how to walk due to a dangerous bacterial infection in his foot. To Bob, a fulfilling life is loving and being loved, as well as freeing himself from resentment and grudges.

Highlights

Bob's multiple journeys learning how to walk, both as a child and as an adult.

The story of Buddha and how it ties into an understanding and acceptance of aging and illness.

His story of a friend's awe-inducing mindfulness on a nature walk.

Why death is important and even necessary to the human experience.

Finding the balance of interconnectedness and separation in life and reconciling the two.

The difference between "reacting" and "responding" in mindfulness.

Altering our relationship to pain if we can't be rid of it.

Finding the space between stimulus and response and using awareness to take advantage of it.